Research

Research

For decades, "reading, writing, and 'rithmetic" were considered the most fundamental subjects in American K-12 schools. These days, in order to boost our nation's global competitiveness, many schools and colleges are emphasizing STEM subjects. In light of our shifting educational priorities and, in many places, shrinking school budgets, are there still persuasive arguments to be made for the importance of visual arts as a core school subject for American kids?

An association between resting heart rate and diabetes suggests that heart rate measures could identify individuals with a higher future risk of diabetes, according to an international team of researchers.

Online customer service agents who use emoticons and who are fast typists may have a better chance of putting smiles on their customers' faces during business-related text chats, according to researchers.

Women who choose not to participate in a clinical trial may be significantly more likely to later regret that decision than women who choose to participate in the study, according to a team of Penn State researchers.

Alternative exchange systems are changing how we buy, barter and share. Distinguished Professor of Information Sciences and Technology John Carroll's research -- on cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin; timebanks, including twists on the model like Uber; and local currencies -- offers insights into how these exchange systems may offer economic and social advantages over traditional money.

This summer, Penn State researchers are partnering with the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) to investigate a major obstacle facing renewable energy -- uncertainty in energy production due to atmospheric conditions like cloud cover or wind speed. The team seeks to develop new algorithms that better predict the amount of energy produced by solar and wind sources, with a goal to increase the use of renewable energy on a daily basis and reduce costs.

Gray wolves in Yellowstone National Park have given researchers the first scientific evidence from wild mammals that living in a group can lessen the impacts of a chronic disease. The research also is one of the first studies to measure the costs of infected nonhuman individuals of any species on members of their group. A paper describing the research was published in Ecology Letters on May 18.

As part of Penn State President Eric Barron's INVENT Penn State initiative, Penn State Harrisburg has been awarded $50,000 in seed funding to help the college develop the Center for the Next Step, which will enhance entrepreneurial environments and encourage students, faculty and community members to transform their intellectual property and creative works for local businesses, industries and communities.

Khanjan Mehta is a man with a mission -- solving the problems that make it so difficult to provide energy, clean drinking water, food security, and health care to some of the poorest nations on Earth. As the founding director of HESE -- Humanitarian Engineering and Social Entrepreneurship -- in the College of Engineering, Mehta leads a group of engaged undergraduates who are designing new technologies and, equally important, figuring out how to get those technologies into the hands of the people who need them.

The survival and proliferation of usually harmless Escherichia coli in the gut of inflammatory bowel disease patients may now be better understood, as researchers have defined a fundamental mechanism through which the bacteria can thrive during flare-ups.

Around 55 million years ago, an abrupt global warming event triggered a highly corrosive deep-water current through the North Atlantic Ocean. The current's origin puzzled scientists for a decade, but an international team of researchers has now discovered how it formed and the findings may have implications for the carbon dioxide emission sensitivity of today's climate.

A curriculum in density-functional theory (DFT) for graduate students in STEM fields is the goal of a National Science Foundation grant of nearly $3 million over five years awarded to a team of Penn State faculty.

Cecilia McGough, current Penn State Schreyer Honors College Scholar and sophomore in the Eberly College of Science, is credited with co-discovery of new pulsar after a summer National Science Foundation project gave a high school team access to the Green Bank Telescope. Further observations have revealed this pulsar has the widest orbit of any around a neutron star and is part of only a handful of double neutron star systems.

Obesity and depression -- not only lack of sleep -- are underlying causes for regular drowsiness, according to Penn State College of Medicine researchers. They say these findings could lead to more personalized sleep medicine for those with excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS).